Washington Insider

Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Pat Roberts (R-KS) and ranking member Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) may have their disagreements these days, but they agree that they have other bills to consider before they begin work on the 2018 farm bill, according to The Hagstrom Report. Roberts and Stabenow both said they look forward to the Senate considering their bipartisan child nutrition reauthorization bill.

President Obama designated the Sewell-Belmont House and Museum, a site on Capitol Hill that has been central to the fight for women's equality for over a century, as America's newest national monument. Connie Tipton, IDFA president and CEO, serves on the board of the museum, now known as the Belmont-Paul Women’s Equality National Monument, and attended the announcement ceremony.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and the groups interested in the issue of labeling genetically modified foods all said that General Mills’ decision to label foods according to the new Vermont law shows the need for a federal solution, according to The Hagstrom Report.

In a sign of the difficulties reauthorizing the child nutrition programs face in Congress, an aide said the House Education and the Workforce Committee is only “in the early stages” of writing a five-year bill to reauthorize the programs. Mandy Schaumburg, the committee’s education deputy director and senior counsel, said the committee hopes to get the bill done this year, according to The Hagstrom Report.

The Senate Agriculture Committee is planning to consider a proposed bill that would create a national uniform standard for governing the labeling of bioengineered foods. Mark up is scheduled for March 1 at 10:00 a.m. Eastern time. IDFA urges members to tell their senators to support the bill proposed by Committee Chairman Pat Roberts (R-KS).

The cost of administering the Federal Milk Marketing Order system may be increasing, according to estimates included in President Obama’s FY 2017 budget, which was submitted recently to Congress. Industry-funded assessments are expected to increase to $60 million, a 15-percent increase over 2015.

The National Association of State Departments of Agriculture held its 2016 Winter Policy Conference last week in Washington, D.C., to discuss topics affecting food and agriculture. “The conference provides an excellent opportunity for our organization to stay engaged at the state level on important policy issues,” said Dave Carlin, IDFA senior vice president.

PHOENIX – CNN political commentators Donna Brazile, a Democrat (pictured), and Ana Navarro, a Republican, offered entertaining comments on the 2016 presidential race at lunch on Tuesday, but said they, like most members of the audience, could not predict who will win the Iowa caucuses or what will happen the rest of the year.

The Senate Agriculture Committee has scheduled a business meeting next Wednesday to mark up a bipartisan bill to reauthorize the child nutrition programs. The markup already has support from the White House, sources familiar with the legislation have told The Hagstrom Report.

As Congress returns this week to Washington from its winter break, Dave Carlin, IDFA senior vice president of legislative affairs and economic policy, offers members an overview of IDFA’s legislative initiatives in 2015 and the steps Congress took to help the dairy industry. Carlin also highlights the policy items that remain on the congressional to-do list for 2016.

The Dietary Guidelines will be released in January, not December, a spokesperson for the Health and Human Services Secretary told The Hagstrom Report. “We are making final preparations, and after consideration, determined that the best time to release the new dietary guidelines was January,” the spokesperson said.

Trade Representative Michael Froman has twice in the last two weeks promoted the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership at British events, according to The Hagstrom Report. In each case, Froman has said that completing TTIP should be easier than some earlier agreements.

The World Trade Organization said U.S. Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) requirements for muscle cuts of meat imports have cost Canada and Mexico more than $1 billion dollars, and they soon will be able to impose retaliatory tariffs. The COOL Reform Coalition urged Congress to repeal provisions that are out of compliance.

Five senators wrote to Senate leaders to convey concerns about the potential for retaliatory tariffs on U.S. exports to Canada and Mexico if current U.S. country-of-origin labeling (COOL) requirements are left unchanged. The ruling is a concern to the U.S. dairy industry because of potential retaliation against dairy exports.

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative released on Nov. 5 the full text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, which spans 30 chapters and more than 2,000 pages. IDFA will review the text and related documents in detail and then provide members with an assessment of the impact on U.S. dairy.